TOWARDS AN ABSOLUTELY FREE-ELECTRON LITERATURE

Bourgeois writers, appertaining to an atomic stage of evolution, tend to write in a way that gives as much importance to form as to content, to technique as to theory, whereas petty-bourgeois writers, appertaining to a relatively post-atomic stage of evolution, tend to write in a way that attaches more importance to content than to form, to theory than to technique, which results, as a rule, in a more spontaneous, improvisational kind of literature - one predominantly concerned with what is being said rather than the way in which it is being said.

Instead of being balanced between appearance and essence in a dualistic compromise, these more contemporary writers are lopsided on the side of essence, dedicated to the inner world of truth as opposed to the outer world of fact. Their work partakes of the improvisational character of modern art, not to mention modern jazz, in a bias for spiritual freedom, wrapped-up in the interior world rather than enslaved to external appearances to the extent of, say, a bourgeois. One might argue that they are intimating, consciously or unconsciously, of a future literary goal in total interiorization, a completely abstract literature such as I envisage taking the guise of computerized poetry. For in writing 'on the wing', they are exposed, as bourgeois authors rarely were, to grammatical laxities and eccentricities - a situation which a pedant would necessarily regard with dismay but which, so one imagines, these modernistic authors are really quite proud of, insofar as it attests to a growing freedom from grammatical constraints, a tugging of the electron equivalent (of words) at the proton/neutron leash (of emotions/meanings), with the promise of a complete departure from that leash in due course.

Few are the petty-bourgeois authors who do actually depart from the leash; indeed, strictly speaking, none of them can, since such a degree of abstract absolutism as I envisage being relevant to a free-electron literature would be incompatible with extreme relativistic criteria, even where experimental literature in the guise of a predominantly abstract poetry was concerned! If such a materialistic poetry, chiefly pertaining to mainstream petty-bourgeois civilization, is absolute or very nearly absolute in itself, it is still relative to the extent of being published in separate volumes, traditionally, of poetry rather than in an anthological format. There is something of a quasi-electron equivalent about it, in contrast to the relatively free-electron status of such petty-bourgeois spiritualistic poetry as is usually represented by a predominating concern with the metaphysical, though one still published, as a rule, in separate editions under the name of a given poet, who may or may not acquire a degree of fame in consequence.

By contrast, proletarian anthological poetry transcends the individual in the collective, and thereby signifies a progression from the relative to the absolute, even when, as is generally the case these days, such anthologies tend to contain material of a less than absolute status. So we may regard them as relatively civilized, with a quasi-electron status germane to their comparatively materialistic integrity. They appear as a kind of outsiders' threat to civilized petty-bourgeois precedent, scorned by all but their authors or those who, through working-class intuition or affiliation, naturally gravitate towards new developments.

No matter! A time will come when, with the development of People’s civilization from relative to absolute levels, such quasi-electron poetry is succeeded by the absolutely free-electron and truly civilized poetry of a non-readerly abstraction, which, availing itself of computer discs, should bring literature to a transcendental climax on a par with abstract holography, pure jazz, and hypermeditation, to name but a few compatible modes of free-electron absolutism. We are probably closer to that time now than we realize!

If the late-twentieth century was essentially a late petty- bourgeois/early proletarian epoch, then it was also on that account an epoch of either experimental or metaphysical poetry - in short, a quintessentially poetical age. Chronologically speaking, this poetry, relative in the main to countries like America and Germany, has superseded fictional writings, whether experimental or illusive, which marked the higher phase of early petty-bourgeois civilization. Novels no less than paintings are now passé, an anachronistic genre in an age of poetry and light art, though even these latter genres, germane to late petty-bourgeois literature and art, are increasingly coming under threat from proletarian genres such as anthological poetry and representational holography, their logical successors in the class-evolution of culture towards an absolute goal in a transcendental civilization. As yet, one cannot, however, speak of experimental/metaphysical poetry as passé, any more than the two chief representative types of light art, since Western society is still broadly bourgeois/proletarian and, doubtless, it will remain so until history may decide otherwise.

But if anthological poetry and representational holography are essentially outsiders in the contemporary Western context, this is not to say that they, or some derivative from them, won't become insiders in a society dedicated to the establishment and furtherance of People’s civilization, a Social Transcendentalist society such as I envisage being relevant to Ireland and other such theocratically-biased countries in the near future. There, by contrast, they would become the accepted norm, rendering all types and degrees of petty-bourgeois literature and art anachronistic, and consequently subject to curtailment.

People's civilization cannot be furthered on the basis of half-measures. There must be a wholehearted commitment to cultural progress and a no-less wholehearted opposition to cultural traditions, whether indigenous or foreign. While relative civilization protects and admires past cultural achievements, even when they pertain to an earlier civilization, the absolute civilization of the future must rigorously proscribe and/or remove all cultural achievements irrelevant to itself. Instead of being conservationist, an Ireland dedicated to the forging of People’s civilization would become iconoclastic, turning, in its relatively formative phase, against bourgeois precedent. Only thus will it subsequently be free to develop what is uniquely transcendental and, hence, absolute in character. There must be a clean break with everything relative!

Neither fiction-writing nor painting nor classical composing would be encouraged in a Social Transcendental Ireland. Such bourgeois/early petty-bourgeois genres ... are radically passé from a transcendentalist point of view. If there are still novelists, painters, and composers at work in the West, they are either bourgeois/early petty-bourgeois types or late petty-bourgeois types who, particularly in the older countries, approach more contemporary trends from a traditional angle, creating, if writers, a kind of novelistic poetry or, if artists, painterly light art or, if composers, orchestral jazz. Ireland, one feels, should be spared such mongrel arts or, at any rate, prevented from becoming contaminated by them! Even such mainstream, more contemporary late petty-bourgeois achievements as experimental or metaphysical poetry, tubular or non-tubular light art, vocal/acoustic or instrumental/electric modern jazz, would be irrelevant to a country bent on developing an absolute civilization.

So, of course, would Socialist Realism and more relative types of folk art, which pertain to a barbarous integrity - the former directed against Western civilization from a state socialist base, the latter existing within Western civilization and testifying to the comparatively uncivilized status of the masses vis-à-vis the bourgeoisie. Barbarisms, whether militant or urbane, external or internal, should no more find encouragement in a Social Transcendental Ireland than passé or relative civilized art. The only barbarism appropriate for such a country would be the iconoclastic activity directed against cultural traditions - the civilized ones in particular.

So an Ireland that was uniquely itself and developing what was uniquely its own, free from both the West and the East alike in the name of People’s civilization. Not, however, an insular nationalist country but, on the contrary, one with an interest in the peaceful development of Social Transcendentalism abroad. In short, the champion of a religious cosmopolitanism, bringing spiritual freedom wherever it can. And such spiritual freedom must needs embrace literature and the other arts as well as religion.

A poetry that is computerized and on route, as it were, to total abstraction. An omega literature, placing maximum emphasis on content, on the literary truth of free-electron words, freed from proton and/or neutron-biased grammatical constraints and therefore intimating of the omega absolutes, those unified electrons of pure spirit such as should one day stem from the highest of the millennial life forms - the superbeingful new-brain collectivizations of the ultimate classless society. Certainly one would look in vain for concessions to appearance in this absolute literature!